Day 6 - Second Verse Same as the First

Mileage - 210
Ride Time - 8 hrs

Well day 6 was pretty much as exact copy of yesterday. We started out in the same rolling hills as yesterday and were just as blown away by how amazing they were. We spent the entire morning crossing cow fields and carving through the corners.

The afternoon was filled with the same straight as an arrow roads and as if one queue the heat kicked in at about noon. We had a little deeper sand which actually helped things a bit. The cross winds were not nearly as bad which also helped us out.

We are in Liberal Kansas tonight and everyone is pretty beaten up from riding for 6 days straight. Also it is the last night that Graham will be with us so a few parting drinks are in order. The three amigos are going to turn into just team brothers Straughn. Tomorrow Palmer and I are headed through the corner of New Mexico and into Colorado. Things should start getting progressively harder from here on as we head out into the desert and then up into the rockies. We are planning to end the day at a motorcycle shop tomorrow where Palmer is going to change his tires to full knobbies, get his crash bars repaired from an earlier fall, and we are both getting oil changes. Should be a fun filled day.

For now I am going to hop in the shower and clean off the dust from the day. Then the plan is to work on Palmers bike a little and then grab some dinner and a few beers.

Day 5 crossing the plains

Mileage- 200
Ride time- 8hrs

The time is flying by way too fast. Day 5 is already over and we are about to sack out. The day started off beautiful as we headed out across the plains. From everything I had read I was expecting today to be pretty boring as we headed in a straight line for hours on end. Was I ever wrong... The day started out twisting over rolling hills. The only other thing I have seen that looked like the view today was in ireland. Really looked like a sea of green.


Here is a little video of the ride.



After leaving lunch the view changed a bit. To picture the ride just think of hoping in your car, cranking up the ac and driving through some of the most beautiful wheat fields you have ever seen. Now take away car, hop on a motorcycle, throw in a few truckloads of sand here and there to make things interesting, put it all in your oven, heat to 98 (record temps today) and bake for 5 hours. Extremely hot but I would not have changed a thing. Everywhere we looked there was a harvester cutting down wheat. It all stretched as far as you could see. Pretty amazing how much farmland there is out there.

Hopefully we are starting a new trend today as all the bikes stayed upright the whole time.

Tomorrow looks like we run for 200+ miles without a single turn. I think the sand is going to continue as well so it should be interesting.

Day 4 mileage is right on target

What a day! Today was a long mileage day of 250 and we loved avery bit of it. We rolled out out of the Ozarks and headed into the plains. Lots of long stretches of straight roads with amazing views. Increadable how quickly the scenery changes on the way across the country.

Day 3 and we made our mileage

Click to enlarge image


It is the end of day 3 and we got in the full mileage for the day. Also we are starting to make a dent in our route as you can see above. Still having some trouble with Palmers side bags melting and we have a new fender in the mail for him but the bikes are running great and everyone is feeling good. Well now that I say it Graham did break his shift lever in a fall today so that is on the repair docket.

Today was pretty straight forward. We hit a few technical sections but until the end of the day I would say we were about at the level of the last two days. At the end of the day (10 miles until the end) we hit the hardest section so far. We were cruising along just fine and all of a sudden the trail got pretty narrow. Then the rocks showed up and then it got steep. We had a few drops but all in all everyone really did great.

I am pretty wiped out so that is about all I can post but I hope to check out some of the video we shot today and post a few tomorrow.

Day 2 still going strong

Today was another great one. We woke up to a huge thunderstorm and thought it was going to be a bad day. Luckily by the time we ate and geared up the weather had cleared andwe headed out under dry skies.

We hit a few technical sections but nothing like yesterdays mud. Although after saying that I do have to mention graham pulled off one of the best crashes so far.




His fender was so packed with mud that his front whel would not spin and made him lose all control in mud. We pulled off the fender and cleaned everything up so he can now actually steer. He's got that going for him now, which is nice.

We also met these friendly pups along the way. If I had any way to carry them I would be theowner of two dogs right now. Here they are camped out under the red devil.



Near the end of the day we worked our way into the foothills of the ozarks (sp?). Really pretty rolling hills that I did not manage to get a single pic of.

At the end of the day we had logged 170 miles which is way under what we were hoping for so tomorrow is an early start to make up time. Gotta sack out now. More tomorrow.

What a first day! Motorcycles hitting the ground already.

What a nutty day. I will have to upload some pics later but it was a great first day!

I met up with graham in memphis after a looooong plane ride and we were shortly on the road. We hit about an hour of pavement to get to the trail. We hit the dirt with smiles on our faces and were making great time until we hit some nasty mud sections. After hitting the mud our progress slowed from 40-45 mph to about 2mph. Bikes started falling and the temp just kept rising. It was a workout and we had some parts damage (palmers beak from his dakar and grahams hand guard and shift lever) but it was all around a great day.

We are now hanging out in the hotel room blasting the ac and working on finding food in this tiny town.

If this was the first day I wonder what is in store... More tomorrow.

In the air

I just woke up from a sweet 30 minute nap bringing my total sleep since getting up at 6.30am yesterday to about an hour and a half. Whew... What time is it?

Did get to meet my parents for breakfast in the atlanta airport. It was fun catching up but I was a little loopy from the flight. Can't wait to see them in seattle in a few months.

I am excited/nervous. Can't wait to meet palmer and graham and get a few miles under our belts.

I get to meet my new motorcycle today too!! Think I am going to name it the red devil.

More later...